THEORETICAL AND EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS OF THE PROFESSIONAL TRANSFORMATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL IN THE CONTEXT OF FORCED MIGRATION

Abstract

The article presents a theoretical and empirical analysis of professional transformation of personality under conditions of forced migration. The relevance of the study is determined by the fact that forced displacement caused by war disrupts established life and career trajectories, changes a person’s social status, complicates the preservation of previous professional identity and requires adaptation to a new sociocultural and labour environment. The aim of the study was to theoretically substantiate and empirically examine the features of professional transformation of personality in the context of forced migration, as well as to identify the role of acculturation strategies, sociocultural adaptation, self-efficacy and hardiness in this process. The empirical basis of the research consisted of the results of an online survey of 50 respondents with forced migration experience, most of whom currently live in Germany. The study used an author’s questionnaire, the General Self-Efficacy Scale by R. Schwarzer and M. Jerusalem, S. Maddi’s Hardiness Survey, a sociocultural adaptation block based on SCAS logic, and J. Berry’s approach to acculturation processes. The results showed that professional transformation of forced migrants has an ambivalent character: it combines the loss or reduction of previous professional status, employment outside one’s speciality, language and institutional barriers with a pronounced readiness for learning, retraining and constructing a new career perspective. Higher levels of self-efficacy, hardiness and sociocultural adaptation were associated with more adaptive experience of professional changes, whereas acculturative difficulties were related to a stronger professional crisis. The findings confirm the need for psychological support for forced migrants aimed at strengthening professional agency, language confidence, hardiness and the ability to constructively reconsider one’s career trajectory in a new social context.